North Carolina’s board of elections approved new mail-in ballot guidelines on Friday, the same day it began sending them to voters. The new guidelines make it easier for the state to reject completed ballots over technicalities.
North Carolina is among the first in the country to begin sending out mail-in ballots ahead of the midterms, and the new guidance reflects talking points repeated by President Donald Trump, who has claimed without evidence that mail-in voting is unreliable and rife with voter fraud.
The Trump administration is currently engaged in a legal battle over a new U.S. Postal Service rule that would require state officials to turn over lists of mail-in voters’ information and require every ballot envelope to have a scannable barcode — a policy change that many election officials worry would cause chaos before midterm voting. On Thursday, the Justice Department asked the Supreme Court to lift a federal judge’s block on the rule.